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I joined a team of latter-day explorers in the Netherlands this month on a quest to discover what American communities can learn from the Dutch about transforming bicycling in the U.S. from a largely recreational pastime to an integral part of our transportation system. Patrick Seidler, vice-chairman of the Bikes Belong Foundation, sponsor of this fact-finding mission for key decision-makers from the San Francisco Bay Area, announced we were in search of the “twenty-seven percent solution”–the health, environmental, economic and community benefits gained in a nation where more than a quarter of all daily trips are made on bicycle.

Of course, the bicycle enjoys certain advantages in the Netherlands, notably a flat landscape and a long cycling tradition. But the idea of learning from the success of the Dutch is not far-fetched. The Netherlands resembles the United States as a prosperous, technologically advanced nation where a huge share of the population owns automobiles. They simply don’t drive them each and every time they leave home, thanks to common sense transportation policies where biking and transit are promoted as an attractive alternative to the car. Indeed, millions of Dutch commuters combine bike and train trips, which offers the point-to-point convenience of the automobile and the speed of transit.

Seidler noted that a delegation of public officials from Madison, Wisconsin returned home from a similar tour of the Netherlands last spring, and within three weeks was implementing what they learned on the streets of the city. Bikes Belong, a non-profit group dedicated to getting more people on bikes more often, regularly takes public officials on tours of cities where biking is popular.

My fellow explorers on this journey included the president of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors (city council) and the city’s director of public works, chief traffic engineer and director of the livable streets program. From San Jose, comes a city council member, the chief traffic engineer and representatives of the business community. Suburban Marin County was represented by city council members from San Rafael, Mill Valley and Corte Madera as well as a transit project director.

Here is what we discovered in the world capital of biking.

Kids Just Wanna Ride Bikes

The trip started in Utrecht, where our group marveled at the parade of bicyclists whizzing past us all over town. This raised an immediate question: Why is biking a way of life in the Netherlands and only a tiny portion of the transportation picture in United States?

We uncovered a large part of the answer that afternoon at a suburban primary school, where Principal Peter Kooy told us that 95 percent of older students–kids in the 10-12 age range–bike to school at least some of the time. Compare that to the 15 percent who either walk or bike to school in the United States, down from 50 percent in 1970, according to the National Center for Safe Routes to School program.

“I came to the Netherlands to have my mind blown about biking,” declared Damon Connolly, vice-mayor of San Rafael, California. “And that sure happened when I heard that 95 percent of kids bike to school.”

This helps explain the childhood obesity epidemic in the U.S., but also why so few adult Americans ride a bike to work or to do errands–a mere one percent of trips compared to 12 percent in Germany, 18 percent in Denmark, and 27 percent in the Netherlands.

A commitment to biking is not uniquely imprinted in the Dutch DNA. It is the result of a conscious push to promote biking that has resulted in a surge of cycle use since the 1970s. And a large part of that success can be attributed to what happens in school. Kids learn how to bike safely as part of their education, said Ronald Tamse, a Utrecht city planner who led our group on a two-wheel tour of the city and its suburbs. A municipal program sends special teachers into the schools to conduct bike classes, and students go to Trafficgarden, a miniature city complete city with roads, sidewalks and busy intersections where students hone their pedestrian, biking and driving skills (in non-motorized pedal cars). At age 11, most kids in town are tested on their cycling skills on a course throughout the city, winning a certificate of accomplishment that ends up framed on many bedroom walls.

“To make safer roads, we focus on the children,” Tamse explained. “Because it not only helps them bike and walk more safely, but it helps them to become safer drivers who will look out for pedestrians and bicyclists in the future.” These kinds of programs would make a huge difference in the United States, where 60 percent of people report in surveys they would like to bike regularly if they felt safer–but only eight percent actually do.

Squarely Addressing the Problems of Bike Safety & Theft

Next stop was the Hague, where bikes account for 27 percent of all trips around the city of 500,000–exactly the average for the Netherlands as a whole. But not content with being merely average, the Hague is spending 10 million euros a year (roughly $14 million) to improve those statistics.

Hidde van der Bijl, a policy officer for cycling in Hague’s city government, outlined the city’s strategy for improving bicycle speed and safety: separating bike paths as much as possible from city streets; and when that is not possible, designating certain streets as bike boulevards where two wheelers gain priority over cars and trucks. The latter are known as bike boulevards in the U.S., and are being used in Portland, Berkeley, Minneapolis and other cities.

These are practical innovations that could make a dramatic difference in nearly every American town, because research on this side of the Atlantic shows that physical separation from motorized traffic on busy streets is the single most effective policy that gets more people to bike.

But officials in the Hague are realizing that fear about safety isn’t the only thing that discourages people from riding bikes more frequently; that’s why they are tackling the problems of bike parking. This might seem a minor point to Americans cyclists who seldom find it hard to park bikes just a few steps from their destinations. But upon closer look, parking emerges as a significant issue for cyclists in any large city.

“The car is parked out in front of the house on the street, while the bike is stuffed away out back in a shed or they have to carry up and down the stairs in their buildings,” van der Bijl explained. “So people choose the car because it is easier.”

“It’s an issue for me personally,” agreed Ed Reiskin, San Francisco’s director of public works, “because I always have to carry my bicycle down to the street.” People also worry about their bike being stolen off the street at their home or job. That’s why creating more secure bike parking in residential neighborhoods, commercial districts and workplaces is a priority for Hague’s transportation planners.

The city is busy building parking facilities in the basement of new office developments and at strategic outdoor locations throughout the city center, many of them staffed by attendants like at a parking garage. You can park your favorite bike there for a nominal fee, confident it will still be then when you return. (Groningen, the Netherlands biking capital with 59 percent of urban trips made on two wheels, debuted the first guarded parking facility in 1982 and now sports more than 30 in a town of 180,000.)

Meanwhile, in high-density residential neighborhoods, the city is installing bike racks or special bike sheds to make life easier for two-wheel commuters, sometimes taking over auto parking spaces to do it. One parking space can be converted to 10 bikes spaces, according to van der Bijl.

Something Hopeful in Rotterdam

On our third day in the Netherlands, we biked across the Atlantic–at least it felt that way in Rotterdam, a city whose streets seemed almost American. We came face-to-face with familiar road conditions: heavy traffic on four-lane roads with aggressive drivers.

Bob Ravasio, a Marin County Realtor and city council member in the town of Corte Madera, said, “Utrecht seems like a fantasy land now. This is what we’re up against at home.” Rotterdam heightened our optimism about boosting biking in the U.S. when we learned that 22 percent of trips around town each day are made on bicycles–below average among Dutch cities but more than double the rate of any major American city. If they could do it, so could we.

“Rotterdam could be San Francisco or Oakland with more bikes,” observed Damon Connolly.

Even more encouraging was the news from Tom Boot of the city’s planning department that Rotterdam has been increasing its share of bike traffic by three percent annually for the last several years. They’ve achieved this phenomenal growth by expanding and improving the network of bikeways–separating them from car traffic whenever possible and coloring the asphalt bright red everywhere else to clearly mark bike lanes for motorists to see.

The experience of biking through four Dutch cities provided our team of Bay Area transportation leaders with plenty of examples of what they can do to make cycling more safe, popular and pleasurable back home. Bridget Smith, director of San Francisco’s Livable Streets Program, is excited about using more color on the roadways as an inexpensive but dramatic way of making sure everyone can tell bike lanes from car lanes.

The experience also fueled our imaginations about the future of cities. We saw one glimpse of what’s possible on Java Island, a cluster of neighborhoods constructed over the past 10 years in what was once the city’s harbor. It’s a scenic waterfront location with strikingly handsome modern architecture in a pleasing variety of styles that is linked to the rest of the city by tram, road and bike paths. Although brand-new, it exudes a charm reminiscent of the city’s famous canal neighborhoods–which for my money are one of the most vibrant and pleasing urban quarters on earth.

Like old Amsterdam, Java Island enjoys a picturesque waterfront setting. But it shares another trait with the city’s medieval districts that you would never expect in a newly built housing development–it accommodates bicycles more easily than cars. Motorized traffic is shunted to the side of each cluster of apartment buildings in underground parking garages, while pedestrians and bicyclists have free rein of the courtyards that link people’s homes like a green commons.

The result of this visionary planning is more than just lovely–Java Island represents a bold new vision of urban life where people matter more than motor vehicles. You feel a liberating sense of ease moving about these new neighborhoods–and so do the residents. I’ve never seen kids–even really young ones–who look so completely comfortable running around their neighborhoods, not even during my own childhood in the days before autos completely ruled the road. We passed two sets of young girls staging tea parties, one of them taking place on a blanket just inches from the joint biking/walking trail that served as the neighborhood’s main street.

Pascal van den Noort, executive director of the transportation organization Velo Mondial leading our tour through the city, urged the group to “imitate this in California, please.”

Amsterdam city council member, Fjodor Molenaar, who met up with us on Java Island, explained that the Dutch call this an “Auto Luw” development, which translates as “car light” or “car sparse,” adding that this planning idea is now the official policy of the city.

To get a sense of how it feels to bike in the Netherlands, Molenaar recommended this video to us at a meeting the next day with city transportation officials at the mayor’s residence. It’s a trailer for a new movie called Riding Bikes With the Dutch, in which filmmaker Michael W. Bauch chronicles his family’s adventure swapping homes with a family in Amsterdam.

Bringing It All Back Home

After five days of biking around Dutch cities, the Bay Area delegation was fired up about the potential of bicycling to improve life in American cities. On our last day, after a lengthy jaunt through Amsterdam–covering medieval and modern neighborhoods, rich and poor ones, all full of bikers–we dismounted for one last discussion at an outdoor café overlooking the waterfront. The next day most of us would be headed back to our homes and jobs and cars in the U.S., where most people would dismiss the idea of bikes making up a quarter percent of urban traffic as science fiction.

One question popping up all over the group was how we reconcile our amazing experience of biking in the Netherlands with the auto-choked streets of San Francisco, San Jose and Marin County. But as Hillie Talens of CROW (a transportation organization focusing on infrastructure and public space) reminded us, it took the Dutch 35 years to construct the ambitious bicycle system we were now enjoying. In the mid-1970s biking was at a low point in the country and declining fast. Even Amsterdam turned to an American for a plan to rip an expressway through its beautiful central city. But the oil crises of that time convinced the country it needed to lessen its dependence on imported oil.

The Dutch gradually turned things around by embracing a different vision for their cities. While the country’s wealth, population and levels of car ownership have continued to grow through the decades, the share of trips made by cars has not. We could accomplish something similar in the United States, by enacting new plans to make urban cycling safer, easier and more convenient.

Following the Dutch model will make biking mainstream in America. The morning and evening rush hour of cyclists you see on the streets in the Netherlands are not all the young, white, male ultra-fit athletes in Spandex we are accustomed to seeing in the U.S. People of all ages and income levels use bikes for everyday transportation, with women biking more than men.

Of course, we won’t do everything the same as the Dutch– there are considerable differences between the two countries geographically, politically and culturally. This was reflected in the questions our team posed to the numerous transportation experts we met during the week. Where did you find the money to do that? How did you overcome the opposition of motorists, merchants and developers?

Inevitably, American ingenuity will envision solutions that the Dutch, the Danish, the Germans or the Chinese never thought of. But the Netherlands does offer plenty of practical ideas to get started, as well as the inspiration of seeing a place where bikes have gained their rightful role as a form of transportation.

Jay Walljasper is a contributing editor of National Geographic Traveler, senior fellow at Project for Public Spaces and co-editor of OnTheCommons.org. Editor of Utne Reader magazine for 15 years, he is the author of The Great Neighborhood Book and (coming this winter) All That We Share: A Field Guide to the Commons.

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Revolution ( in the US a constitutional right )

The 1776 Declaration of Independence stated that when a long train of abuses by those in power evidence a design to reduce the rights of people to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, it is the peoples right, in fact their duty to engage in a revolution.

and ….. JFK in his own words !

In a speech to the Newspaper Publishers Association in 1961, President Kennedy said:
“No president should fear public scrutiny of his program, for from that scrutiny comes understanding, and from that understanding comes support or opposition; and both are necessary. . . . Without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed, and no republic can survive. That is why the Athenian law makers once decreed it a crime for any citizen to shrink from controversy. And that is why our press was protected by the First Amendment.”

Abraham Lincoln said, just before his assassination:

I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country...Corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money-power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed."
Hmmmm.

. . . → Read More: “Like the plot of a summer horror flick”: All along Canada’s Pacific coast, mussels are dying… Bodies are swollen by cancerous tumors — Unprecedented mutations allowing cancer to spread from one species to another like a virus — Scientists: “It’s beyond surprising” (VIDEO)

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The 23rd ministerial meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the world's largest regional security organization, closed Friday with some consensuses being reached among its member states.

Philippine government troops fought with a heavy number of Abu Sayyaf militants in the south Thursday, killing three, including a soldier and two militants, and injuring six, security officials said Thursday.

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var icx_publication_id = 18566; var icx_content_id = '1068553'; Click here for reuse options! There are no rules anymore, it seems. Donald Trump isn’t letting his job as president force him to stop taking checks from his old job as executive producer of the reality TV show “Celebrity Apprentice.” Despite reportedly being so unprepared for the presi […]

var icx_publication_id = 18566; var icx_content_id = '1068547'; Click here for reuse options! "Make America gasp again!" Trump is already making good on his promise to return America to an earlier time, a time that includes a great deal more air pollution, Paul Krugman writes in Friday's column. He may not be able to bring all those […]

var icx_publication_id = 18566; var icx_content_id = '1068561'; Click here for reuse options! Meaning the espionage Trump invited and otherwise. President Obama has requested that intelligence agencies conduct a review of cyberattacks launched by Russia-backed state actors that may have had an impact on the presidential election and thus infringed […]

var icx_publication_id = 18566; var icx_content_id = '1068541'; Click here for reuse options! Spencer divulged the media's disregard for the black female rocket scientists behind the Apollo moon landing. Octavia Spencer is an Academy award-winning actress with her own day in her home state of Alabama. Her latest film, "Hidden Figures, […]

var icx_publication_id = 18566; var icx_content_id = '1068508'; Click here for reuse options! How exactly do white nationalists propose to create an all-white homeland in America without violence? So now we know: White nationalists have been working more on their wardrobes than on tightening up the rhetoric and logic they use to defend and present […]

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On Wednesday, President Barack Obama announced that the United States would be changing its policy toward Cuba, opening a Havana embassy and expanding travel. “Through these changes, we intend to create more opportunities for the American and Cuban people and begin a new chapter among the nations of the Americas,” President Obama explained. The president neg […]

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Minnesota State Representative Greg Davids is calling for embattled MIT economics professor Jonathan Gruber, the "architect" of Obamacare, to return all $329,000 he was paid by the state of Minnesota as a subcontractor on a 2011 contract to analyze the state's plan to develop its Obamacare health care exchange, MNSure. On November 21, Davids s […]

While some believe today's actions toward Cuba are within the scope of Barack Obama's role as chief executive, there are others who maintain it's not so clear. Given considerable opposition to his move to significantly loosen restrictions as regards Cuba, he may even end up facing a legal challenge. That would be in line with current challenge […]

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ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Handing environmentalists a breakthrough victory, New York plans to prohibit fracking for natural gas because of what regulators say are its unexplored health risks and dubious economic benefits. New York, which overlies part of the gas-rich Marcellus Shale formation that has led to a drilling boom in Pennsylvania and other nearby states, […]

Wednesday, People magazine published an interview titled "The Obamas: How We Deal with Our Own Racist Experiences," in which Michelle Obama claimed it was due to racism that a woman at Target asked her for help to get detergent from a high shelf. "I tell this story, I mean, even as the first lady, during that wonderfully publicized trip I too […]

Despite, or perhaps because of Barack Obama being in the White House - many feel he's done more harm than good to race relations in America - an NBC News/ Wall Street Journal poll "showed the most pessimistic assessment of racial issues in almost two decades." A majority of Americans, 57% now say they are bad. In the wake of protests over the […]

Senator and prospective 2016 Republican presidential hopeful Rand Paul addressed several Goldman Sachs executives during "a closed-door audience at the firm's 200 West offices as part of an internal company speaker series known as Talks@GS." Reportedly, "Paul spoke about foreign policy, the economic recovery, and race relations, ... and h […]

[Dalsan Radio] As the 2016 Somalia Parliamentary election results streamed in from across the regions new faces and old faces in the politics of the horn of Africa country emerged as winners in a poll that has turned out to have its fair share of surprises

[Deutsche Welle] Ghanaian opposition candidate Nana Akufo-Addo has said he was "quietly confident" he won his country's election. The electoral commission has yet to release most results from Wednesday's vote.

[allAfrica] The Gambia is free at last of Yahya Jammeh. Newly elected President Adama Barrow must now take bold steps to restore Gambia's place as a responsible West African nation, with special emphasis on cooperative and productive ties with Senegal.

[Monitor] The Hague/Kampala -Secret communication intercepts by the Ugandan army and police have come in handy for prosecution at The Hague to build its case that former Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) commander Dominic Ongwen co-planned and commanded attacks against civilians, church institutions and military targets in northern Uganda.

[HRW] Equatorial Guinea's government has tirelessly worked to stop the prosecution of the president's eldest son, known as Teodorin Nguema, who is accused of laundering tens of millions of Euros in France that were allegedly stolen from his oil-rich country. But yesterday, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) - the United Nation's main cou […]

[Radio Dabanga] River Nile -An academic hospital in northern Sudan has dismissed eighteen lab technicians who participated in a strike staged against the deteriorating working environment. Ten others were stopped from entering the hospital.

President Maduro ordered intelligence services to take “necessary actions” as citizens began to denounce difficulties with payment terminals and electronic banking platforms across the country. read more

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) officially recognised Thursday the Venezuela festival of El Callao on its List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. read more

A prolific consultant, author and academic specialising in political communication, Mario Riorda spends a great deal of time crisscrossing the map, addressing audiences eager to hear his analysis of the intersection of politics and communication. Author of the recently released Cambiando: el eterno comienzo de la Argentina, Riorda analysed the first year of […]

Buenos Aires: A tale of two cities December 2, 2016

by Agustina Larrea Housing, unemployment, healthcare, pollution, infant mortality rates, even life expectancy — there’s a world of difference between the thriving north and forgotten south of Buenos Aires “When the City government neglects our neighbourhood it has concrete consequences: our kids are dying. Literally,” says Natalia Quinto, activist and member […]

by Sorrel Moseley-Williams While model Germán Fontanini essentially lives out of a suitcase, moving between the likes of India and South Africa for jobs, he spends considerable time living in the world’s most populated country. Currently on location in Cape Town, Hangzhou, China, is his base.

Yesterday afternoon, we heard that the Women’s Boat to Gaza was making good progress on the Mediterranean and the women on board were excited about meeting the people on the shores of Gaza who were waiting for them. Some Palestinians even spent the night at the beach to greet them. At 15:58 CET, flotilla organizers lost contact with the boat, Zaytouna-Oliva. […]

In the early morning hours of Sunday September 18, the Israeli police began an arbitrary arrest campaign targeting Palestinian activists from the National Democratic Assembly (NDA). The arrests targeted the Head of the political party, Mr Awad Abdelfattah, among other dozens of leaders and members, part of them members of the local authority councils. The ar […]

By Greta Berlin, Co-Founder, Free Gaza movement We were so late leaving Cyprus for Gaza. The 30+ passengers waiting in the hot, dusty confines of the University in Nicosia were fed up and beginning to wonder if two boats ever existed. Every day, I went into the morning meeting and said, “Not today, they are in a storm.” Or, “Not today, they have had problems […]

The Debra Evenson Venceremos International Award is presented on an annual basis as a national Guild award to honor outstanding international legal work, legal solidarity, international advocacy, and justice beyond borders, in the tradition of Debra Evenson. Former Guild President Debra Evenson was a leading expert on Cuba’s legal system, a law professor and […]

On Aug. 18, 2014, a crowd gathered outside the downtown St. Louis office of Jay Nixon, the governor of Missouri. The governor, responding to protests in Ferguson over the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager, had just activated the National Guard, and the demonstrators outside his office were outraged at what they saw as heavy-ha […]

MEMO | Sept 2, 2014 Senior Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahar said on Monday that the United States is a partner to the Israeli occupation and its crimes committed in the Gaza Strip.Speaking to the Palestinian Al-Quds television, he said: “We mean the US administration, not the American people, who took to the streets in […]

MEMO | Tuesday, 02 September 2014 11:46 IMAGES The explosives engineering division in the Ministry of Interior in the Gaza Strip yesterday destroyed around five tonnes of unexploded bombs that were launched by the Israeli army on the sector during their latest assault. Imad Al-Amasi, director of the division, told the Anadolu news agency: “Today, […]

Tuesday September 02, 2014 05:05 by IMEMC News & Agencies Israeli forces kidnapped six Palestinians and physically assaulted two teenagers in West Bank districts, on Monday, according to reports by security sources. Also on Monday, seven residential and agricultural structures in the southern Hebron Governorate were demolished. PCHR archive photo Israe […]

Tuesday September 02, 2014 10:03 by Saed Bannoura – IMEMC News Palestinian medical sources report that a man and a child have died of serious injuries suffered, in different strikes, during Israel’s extensive bombardment and aggression on the Gaza Strip. Image – Palestinian Ministry Of Health The sources said resident Bassem ‘Ajjour died, on […]

Tuesday September 02, 2014 10:54 by Saed Bannoura – IMEMC & Agencies Dozens of Israeli soldiers invaded, on Tuesday at dawn, ‘Anza village, south of the northern West Bank city of Jenin, broke into and ransacked several homes, and kidnapped 17 Palestinians. Soldiers also invaded a flea market near Nablus, and closed it. File […]

by Richard Silverstein on September 1, 2014 | Tikun Olam | תיקון עולם IDF Col. Ofer Winter’s approach to Rafah: apres moi, le deluge. The Israeli attorney general and military prosecutor have begun investigations of numerous incidents during Operation Protective Edge which may reach to the level of war crimes : While fighting still raged, […]

By Stephen Lendman | Global Research, September 01, 2014 On August 31, Israel’s Civil Administration announced confiscation of around 1,000 acres of privately owned Palestinian land. It lawlessly declared it State Land. It’s to establish a Gva’ot settlement. It’s located south of Bethlehem. It’s in the Southern West Bank. Peace Now calls itself “the leading […]

However dubious big Republican supporters of Israel felt about Donald Trump, in the last weeks of the election campaign many of them gave a lot of money to the Republican Party; and Sheldon Adelson and his wife gave $10 million to a pro-Trump PAC

This January, after several years of often-heated discussion and review, the Modern Language Association’s representative body will consider a resolution to endorse the Palestinian call for a boycott of Israeli academic institutions. The relative absence of Palestinian testimony from debates at scholarly associations prompted a number of MLA members to visit […]

At Texas A&M, alt-right leader Richard Spencer praises Israel for its intrinsically racist and exclusionist policies, and Hillel Rabbi Matt Rosenberg has no answer. No Zionist can have one, and no wonder Israel's defenders are queasy these days.

After a fire erupted in the illegal Israeli settlement of Halamish, dozens of Palestinians have been detained in the occupied West Bank village of Deir Nidham. And it has been blockaded by the Israeli army, “turning the lives of 1,600 into a prison,” locals told Ma‘an.

Palestinians have lived in the refugee camps around Lebanon since the Nakba in 1948 when they were forcibly ejected from their homeland by Israel. Most of these Palestinians have never set foot in Palestine and are prevented from doing so by Israel. Only the oldest have any memory of their homeland. Celia Peterson interviewed Palestinians of various ages in […]

Occupation-Free Portland, a coalition of faith, social justice and peace organizations, in collaboration with Seattle Mideast Awareness Campaign, have launched an ad campaign on TriMet buses serving the Portland, Oregon, metropolitan area that read, “Portland: Divest from Caterpillar. Caterpillar Violates Human Rights from Standing Rock to Palestine.” The ad […]

Chemi Shalev and Jeremy Ben-Ami say that if Keith Ellison is defeated for Democratic Party chair, there will be a backlash against the organized Jewish community that has opposed a rising star; and that is bad for Jews. Ellison is shaking up the discussion of US policy.

Jewish national self-determination (also known as Zionism) is an unshakable right and today an indivisible part of Jewish identity. You question it at your peril. Despite all that, Robert Cohen is chucking it in. You can have it back he says. He doesn't need it.

Last night the Peace United Church of Christ in Santa Cruz, CA voted to refrain from buying Hewlett-Packard (HP) products until HP companies cease to profit from Israel’s violation of Palestinian human rights. The congregation made the move as part of the HP-Free Churches campaign initiated by the Friends of Sabeel North America.

The Venice Commission, an advisory body at the human rights watchdog Council of Europe, says Turkey is abusing state of emergency laws in its wider efforts to purge so-called state saboteurs after the failed mid-July coup. It said the government is casting too wide a net over people linked to the Fethullah Gulen movement, which Ankara blames for the coup att […]

Dutch anti-EU, anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders will hear Friday whether he has broken the law by calling for "fewer Moroccans" in the Netherlands, but has already said in a statement he would not change his behaviour. "The verdict, whether acquittal or conviction, will not change anything de facto," Wilders said according to the Telegraaf new […]

The South Korean parliament has voted to impeach its scandal-hit president amid mass protests in Seoul. Park Geun-Hye faces being the first democratically-elected leader of the country to be kicked out of office following the vote. The impeachment motion had accused Park of constitutional and criminal violations ranging from a failure to protect people’s liv […]

Obama traveled to MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida this week to address the military for the last time. Obama defended his policies that resulted in the rise of the Islamic State. The lame-duck president also defended Islam and blamed Americans for feeding the terrorist narrative. Good grief. Breitbart reported: “Obama said, ‘We are […]

A sobering Ministry of Defense (MoD) report circulating in the Kremlin today states that President Putin’s ordering to full combat alert status yesterday of the feared S-400 Triumf air defense missile systems in the Western Military District along the Federations entire border with NATO aligned nations was in direct response to the “Christmas Threat” issued […]

A 41-year-old man had been detained on suspicion of murder, after he is believed to have set fire to his wife on a street in the northern town of Kiel on Wednesday. “We think it’s clear in this case that malevolence and brutality, both requisites for a murder charge, exist,” said state prosecutor Axel Bieler […]

It’s official – The ‘TRUMP STOCK MARKET RALLY’ continues to shatter the record books. As a matter of fact, what we have seen since President-Elect Donald Trump won the Presidential election on November 8th, has never occurred before. Out of 21 days since the election, the Dow has reached all time closing highs 13 of […]

Motorcyclist catches an escaped yellow parakeet with one hand /u/maestro89

Two Years /u/GreyRobe

You are clever my friend....very clever..... /u/4kaee

Last nights sunset in Zion NP, Utah [OC] 1200x797 /u/cozmo2312

Japan has launched a cargo ship which will use a half mile- (700m)-long tether to remove some of the vast amount of debris from Earth's orbit. /u/NinjaDiscoJesus

The Last Guardian (Dunkey vid) /u/CatsLikeToMeow

I am the harbinger of the companions, arch-mage, the listener of the dark brotherhood, thane of all 9 holds, master of the thieves guild, nightingale, werewolf, dragonborn... and this is still my proudest moment. (Credit u/lithium2017) /u/Clever_BigMack

It's Uber for haircuts! It's Uber for ice cream! The rash of startups claiming to mimic Uber but for other goods and service don't really get what Uber is. The post The 'Uber for X' Fad Will Pass Because Only Uber Is Uber appeared first on WIRED.

Without external cameras or beacons, Occipital's environment-mapping headset adds advanced mixed-reality capabilities to the iPhone 6, 6S, and 7. The post The Bridge Headset Powers Up iPhone VR With Positional Tracking appeared first on WIRED.

Dyson's Cu-Beam Duo looks like a satellite, runs for decades, and gives you total control of your office lighting. The post Dyson's Cu-Beam Duo Is a Radically New Office Lamp—Seriously appeared first on WIRED.

Curated this year by Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset, the 15th Istanbul Biennial, titled ‘A good neighbor,’ will deal with notions of neighborhood and home while exploring how living modes have changed. The biennial will take place between Sept 16 and Nov 12, 2017

Turkish actress Tuba Büyüküstün, who has many fans around the world thanks to her appearance in various TV series, especially in the Middle East, drew great interest at the recent 13th Dubai International Film Festival.

Fifty-one academics out of 87 who were issued detention warrants have been detained by police at Istanbul University over suspected links to U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen, accused of orchestrating the July 15 failed coup attempt, state-run Anadolu Agency has reported.

Excavation work in a house in the southern province of Mersin’s Tarsus district has drawn much curiosity after continuing for 20 days under the direction of the special forces and the National Intelligence Agency (MİT), Doğan News Agency has reported.

Turkey has criticized a decision by a Greek appeals court to reject an extradition request for five Turkish soldiers who fled to the country after the failed coup of July 15, repeating its call for the extradition of a total of eight Turkish military personnel

The Turkish government has expressed concern over Israel’s plans to establish a new settlement project on occupied Palestinian territories, in a statement issued by the Foreign Ministry late on Dec. 8.